KARACHI - Once Mahatma Gandhi wrote that “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”

The recently incident occurred in District East Karachi reportedly had reflected the social behaviour of the society, where activists of political parties severely tortured a donkey to humiliate their political rivals. First they put the name of their political rival on the donkey and later punched him in the face and abdomen several times, his nose was broken, kicked all over his body until he collapsed, he had rope marks and later car rammed into him. 

The donkey was rescued by Aysha Chundrigar Foundation. According to the foundation, the donkey still cannot stand up on his own. Once he sits down, he is unable to move without help. His body is still rigid, his facial bones have stiffened but he cannot control his jaw that is still trembling due to the trauma he has faced.

“The only positive thing is that he is able to eat what is being fed to him and drink water. We are trying our best to curb his pain and suffering by giving him apt medication with the help of our vets,” it concluded. Talking to The Nation, SSP East, Murtaza Bhutto said if anyone interested to register the FIR against cruel incident, must contact with police.

“We were also informed by the social media, I don’t know where the incident happened and who was behind this brutality,” Bhutto added.

Dr Beenish Shoro, head of department of Psychiatry, Sindh Government Hospital, Liaquatabad while talking to The Nation said: “Recent incidence of aggression towards a living creature can be broken down into two components. One is the presence of hostility; violence and cruelty of a mob and other is the level of impulsivity intolerance and lack of empathy towards a living soul, apart from their learning, training and lack of remorse.

“This anti-social outburst is an impulsive and criminal effort to hide/mask their level of anxiety; low self esteem; disrespect of nature and lack of control of resources and circumstances.”

She further added that when the feelings and energies are not directed towards creativity or betterment of society; those will ultimately be expressed through dangerous aggression and criminality.

Shoro further pointed out that: “This intolerance is not limited to political consciousness, it is now prevailing in our day-to-day affairs, our interpersonal relationship and now expending towards gifts of nature.

“To deal with this issue we need to address the actual problems and positive constructive behaviours should be adopted.”

She further pointed out that theirs personality and lack of sympathy or empathy towards anything even though they understand the meaning of pain and grief.

She further added that there were provoking factor also, “Yes, it wasn’t planned or needed no strategy to follow and put any efforts into it,” she said, adding “it was just their impulsive behaviour that left them with no conscience or superego even in lighter terms they suddenly lose their morality; so called ethics and even humanity.”

Dr Mehboob Ali, department of Political Science, Karachi University while talking to The Nation condemned the cruel behaviour of political activists and said it was just individual act, and we could not hold the whole society responsible for it.

“I agree they were aggressive and it was responsibility of our political leaders to not use abusive language against their political rivals,” he said, adding that they must teach tolerance to their political activists.

“However, as a whole we are living in tolerated society and by the time the people will attain more political consciousness, if the system continue,” he concluded.

Replying to question, how to deal with this behaviour, he added that “We don’t need to throw them out of society or put them in extreme guilt, they need to be educated, counselled and their aggression should be turned into positive healthier and constructive behaviour.”